The Birds in the Food Court
by LittleMonsoon
Summary: Leni and Lucy talk and bond as they wander the empty halls of a dead shopping mall.
1. Chapter 1

_**AN:** Here's a two-shot inspired by the dead malls near my home._

* * *

As thriving as the Royal Woods Mall was when Leni was sixteen, it was nothing compared to how it was a decade prior. Back then, during what might be called the mall's golden age, the shopping center was like it's own city. Thousands of people could be seen everyday rushing from store to store and sale to sale, and no matter how spacious the building was it was nearly impossible to walk without bumping into somebody else. This was especially frightening to the average child, wading through a sea of legs with unfamiliar faces glaring down.

Not for Leni though. Even when she was just a little girl Leni loved the place, with its hectic atmosphere and sights and sounds and smells. The perfume that wafted from the entrances of department stores, the sunlight that bounced off the shining surfaces of the walls and railings, and the bubbly pop music and sales announcements that sounded over the loudspeakers, struggling to be heard over the noise of the shouting crowd. Leni adored it all.

Less in love with the place were her parents. Trips to the mall for them always devolved into exercises in wrangling their many children.

There was a summer day where they sat at a table in the food court, their legs exhausted from hours of walking and their arms tired from carrying around bags of merchandise, most of which contained dolls for their daughters, who ate and played blissfully unaware of their parents' tiredness. Luan and Luna waved around cheap plastic toys, included with the kiddie meals their father bought for them, while Lori admonished them, putting on a show of being the responsible one of the bunch. Rita was struggling to hold Lynn in her arms as the girl tried to reach for the table and climb on top. Barely a toddler and already desperate to prove her strength.

Leni only sat still, cheerfully popping french fries into her mouth, admiring the dresses of any of the pretty women that passed by. Even then she knew one day she'd like to make such beautiful clothing herself. Many a notebook back at her house were filled with crude drawings made in crayon of extravagant designs. Someday, she dreamed, the mall mannequins would model outfits of her designs.

Her daydream was interrupted by a soft chirping down on the floor a few feet away. Turning her head she saw a small bird flittering about on the tile. Instantly Leni was enraptured, picturing herself an animated princess like those in her favorite films, the kind where the animals all talked and the birds were always whistling a happy song.

Grabbing a handful of fries, she snuck under the table and crawled on her hands and knees closer to the bird, and though they're usually skittish creatures that are easily spooked this one didn't fly off, even when Leni was only a couple of feet away.

"Hello little birdie!" she said cheerfully, "are you hungry?" She tossed it a french fry, and after regarding it for a moment as it landed on the floor the bird grabbed the treat in its beak and flew away. Leni followed its motions with eyes full of wonder, but when she looked up she saw her father staring down at her with a stern expression. Instantly the magic the little girl felt in her heart was drained, replaced with a slight sense of shame at the thought that she was about to get a scolding.

The scolding, though light, did come as Lynn Sr reached down and helped his daughter up. "Don't crawl on the floor, sweetie. It's dirty. And you shouldn't feed the birds either. They're vermin."

"What's vermin mean?"

"It means they might make you sick."

She cast her eyes downward and kicked sadly at the ground. "I'm sorry daddy."

"It's okay, Leni. Come on. Finish your lunch, then we have to go home."

"Can't we look around a little more?"

"Maybe another day, sweetie."

* * *

Eleven years later, there was nothing left.

It started small. At first, Leni only noticed that a few stores were offering fantastic sales up to 80% off (she wasn't usually good with numbers, but even she knew that was a lot), sales she happily took advantage of without realizing at the time that most of those shops were trying to sell off all their merchandise before going out of business. They called these liquidation sales, an odd name as far as Leni was concerned, as all the clothes she bought were perfectly dry. Then Crowley's closed, and it was all downhill from there.

It always vexed her why the department store was called an "anchor store." After all, they didn't sell any anchors. It was only after it was gone that she realized what the title implied. Not long after, other, smaller stores started closing, only a few at first, but it didn't take much time before more and more followed suit. Like lifeboats tethered to a freighter at sea, they needed a sturdy mooring to prevent them from drifting away. Now nothing remained open but an off-track betting office and a food court with half the vendors missing. During the lunch rush men and women in business attire could be seen seated at tables feasting on low quality food in between their work. Aside from them, the mall was usually empty most days of customers except for the elderly mall-walkers that paced around, hugging their turns with such intensity it was like they were training for marathons. All the swarms of shoppers were gone.

Gone as well were the birds, long ago taken care of by mall management after multiple complaints. Pest control dealt with them with secret traps and poison, though the ever optimistic Leni always believed they merely migrated south one winter and liked their new home so much they never bothered with returning.

The kiddie train her baby sister once rode so happily now stood dead on its tracks, gone the way of the real railroad.

Most of her siblings stopped going. To them, a mall without shops was as useless as a cicada's shredded husk, its only purpose to be forgotten about, an attitude that struck Leni as almost cruel in its disloyalty. Lincoln especially was even grateful for its dire state. He always hated going to the mall, and even though he missed the arcade that used to be on the first floor he wasn't too broken up about losing it, seeing as there were multiple other ways for him to play video games.

Only Leni and Lucy still liked going there, both for different reasons.

There was a winter day where they walked along bundled in their coats, passing by empty storefronts, footsteps echoing. Metal gates covered every abandoned entrance, each one dark inside and empty. The whole mall was now a zoo with nothing but empty exhibits. Absurdly, as she passed them by Leni thought to herself that they'd make good bird cages.

"This is so sad," Leni said. "It's completely dead."

For Lucy, the deader the better. "I actually prefer it like this. It shambles along, zombie-like, like a vampire stuck its teeth in this place and went sluuuuuuurp." A disgusting image, punctuated with Lucy's sound effect, flashed through Leni's mind and she couldn't help but shudder slightly. Lucy had a way of inspiring such reactions. "You know," she added offhand, "I saw a movie once about zombies taking over a mall. It was pretty cool."

The thought terrified Leni, and as they walked the next few moments in silence her overactive imagination pictured masses of rotting bodies limping through the building, riding the escalators, and trying on hideous clothes in all the dressing rooms. To take her mind off the vision, she started craning her neck around to admire the architecture. Without any crowds, it was easier to appreciate certain details. For example, just how massive the mall was. Two floors covering upwards of two million square feet, with almost three hundred retailers. Now housing next to nothing.

She always thought the building was beautiful, especially the ceiling that consisted of hundreds of panels of skylights. Glass squares that sloped upwards at an angle. From the outside, they resembled crystal pyramids jutting from the roof. The sunlight that beamed down through the glass reflected off the store windows and white tiles that made up the walls. It was nearly blinding it was so bright, but she supposed there needed to be plenty of sun for all the palm trees and pots of vibrant green ivy planted decoratively around the mall to grow healthy.

They walked awhile, no real destination in mind, when Leni spotted something ahead and ran to an empty retailer. To the untrained eye, it was indistinguishable from any of the other dead shops on either side. But to someone like Leni, who had walked through the place countless times at the height of its popularity and memorized the layout, it was Gadzooks.

Not even a year ago Leni could have walked in and be greeted by rows of the latest fashion trends. Her closet still burst with clothes from there. Now, not only had this location closed, but the entire chain across the country died out as well. Though the sign had been taken down, a faded imprint of its name remained above the entrance, barely perceptible. It would take years for the label scar to vanish completely. Unless of course the whole building was demolished before too long.

She stood in front of the glass, right hand forming a visor above her eyes so she could look in without seeing her reflection. Lucy joined her, though unsure of why they stopped.

"What are we looking at?" she asked.

"This used to be one of my favorite stores," Leni said. Face still pressed against the window, she used her free hand to point out what used to be the various sections of the shop. "They'd hang the dresses over there, along the right wall. And over on that table they had sweaters, some of the cutest I'd ever seen." With a slight blush blooming on her cheeks, she looked down at her sister. "This was where I met Chaz and gave him that love letter. I wanted to get a part time job here so we could spend more time together, but then he was laid off."

Returning her gaze to the window, she made out the shape of a lone figure in the back corner, covered by shadows.

Leni gasped, worried. "Oh my gosh! I think somebody's trapped in there!"

"It's just a mannequin," Lucy said.

Upon closer inspection it was obvious. Straining her eyes, she looked harder and could make out a plastic body, unclothed, its features clearly feminine though its face was blank. "What's it still doing in there?" Leni asked, sounding strangely worried. "Doesn't it know the store's closed? Should we get a security guard to help it out?"

Lucy just looked up at her sister, her expression as blank and unreadable as ever. After a moment she sighed. "I'm sure it feels right at home. This mall belongs to the mannequins now. "

"Well, I guess it's good that somebody still gets to enjoy it." She finally stepped away from the window, and the two of them continued their stroll. "So," Leni asked, "like, what do you want to do?" Not that there was much they could do. Out of the corner of her eye she caught a glimpse of the mall's one remaining business. "We could bet on a few horse races!" she suggested, trying to sound excited, not knowing it was illegal for her to gamble.

"Actually, I'd just like to sit somewhere and read a little." She pulled out a black book of poetry from within the folds of her clothes and held it aloft. "This is a great place to think."

"Oh. Okay."


	2. Chapter 2

There stood a fountain at the center of the Royal Woods Mall, a place encircled by benches and chairs that would vibrate and massage anyone willing to feed a dollar into the slots on their sides. A place to take a breather from the hectic experience of shopping. A shallow pool pressed into the ground, blue tiles patterned on the bottom. Erupting like geysers from countless hidden nozzles were jets of water shooting up and arcing towards the middle, where one towered straight into the air high above the others. Combined with the palm trees planted strategically around the fountain, it called to mind some ancient hanging garden of a more dignified civilization.

The surrounding area always smelt faintly of chlorine intermixed with the strong scents of cheap food wafting around from the food court.

Skin lightly sprayed by the fountain's mist, Leni sat on the edge of the water, dozens of pennies in her palm. Face blank, she mechanically tossed them one by one into the pool where they joined hundreds of others thrown in by other shoppers. A wishing well for a modern age. Lucy was sprawled out on a nearby bench, absorbed in her reading.

Or at least she was last time Leni checked.

"Hey Leni," she said, appearing like a phantom behind her sister. Leni jumped in fright, her remaining coins going flying and landing in the fountain. Before they hit the water, Leni made sure to say the rest of her wishes in her head so they wouldn't go to waste.

"Hi Lucy," she said once the shock wore off. "Wanna make wishes with me? I was just wishing for all the shops to come back."

"Leni…" she considered whether or not to tell her sister that since she told Lucy her wish, any chance of it coming true was lost. Then she saw the hopeful expression on Leni's face, and she couldn't bring herself to wipe it away. Instead, she merely asked, "Do you want to hear a poem?"

Leni perked up and nodded. "Sure," she said. She wasn't usually one for poetry, but she did like encouraging her sister.

With a nod, Lucy flipped a few pages of her book until the poem was staring her in the face. Starting with a slight cough to clear her throat, she read on, her voice monotonous yet eloquent.

 _I met a traveller from an antique land_

 _Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone_

 _Stand in the desert... near them, on the sand,_

 _Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,_

 _And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,_

 _Tell that its sculptor well those passions read_

 _Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,_

 _The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed:_

 _And on the pedestal these words appear:_

 _'My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:_

 _Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!'_

 _Nothing beside remains. Round the decay_

 _Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare_

 _The lone and level sands stretch far away._

She didn't take her eyes off the page during the entire time she was reading, so when she looked up to gauge Leni's reaction she was surprised to see for a split second that her sister's smile had faded and her eyes had gone dewey. In an instant she forced herself to grin again, perhaps wider that was natural. Lucy at first thought nothing of it. "That was really pretty, Lucy," she said.

It was sweet of her to say so, but Lucy had the nagging suspicion that Leni was just feigning interest. Still, Lucy appreciated the compliment. "That was Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley," she said. "It's one of my favorites."

"I don't think I really understood all the words," Leni said, the faintest trace of shame creeping into her voice.

That didn't surprise Lucy in the slightest. While she loved her sister, Lucy didn't really think Leni had the mind for deep literary analysis. "Well, it _was_ written over 200 years ago, so it uses a lot of archaic language."

As if to prove her point, Leni asked, "What does archaic mean?"

"Very, very old." Taking care to speak as plainly as possible, Lucy explained, "The poem is about a civilization that over thousands of years has faded away until nothing is left but a desert. But in the middle of this desert there's still a statue of a king half sunk in the sand dunes, and on this statue there's a boast written about how vast and mighty his kingdom is. The irony is that the kingdom is long gone, destroyed by time, because no matter how powerful or great you think you are, nothing in this world is permanent. Time rots everything."

She finished talking, proud of her interpretation, and waited for Leni to respond. But the older girl merely stared blankly a moment, as if her mind were an old computer struggling valiantly to process a too-large photograph. Finally she chuckled nervously, taking her hand and swinging it above her scalp, a literal way of telling Lucy that her words went over her head.

Lucy sighed, thinking of ways to put across her point in terms her sister would understand. Then all of a sudden inspiration struck. "Take this mall for example. Back in the 90's hundreds of these places were built all over America, and most of them were very successful, including this one. They must have thought this place would last forever, that people would keep shopping here until humanity went extinct. Now, only 20 years later, it's the malls that are going extinct. And it's not just the Royal Woods Mall. All over the country malls are dying. Everything dies eventually, Leni. People and places alike. And they leave behind only traces of their time on earth."

Again Leni went silent, and Lucy assumed that was because once again she couldn't wrap her mind around what was said. She was about to give up entirely and return to her bench to write some more, when Leni spoke up. You mean…" she began, a bit unsure, "like that mannequin we saw in the store? It's the last survivor from the mall from before it was dead, kinda like how the statue in that poem was the last survivor of its kingdom or whatever before it collapsed."

"Yeah, kind of," Lucy said, strangely impressed. "That's a good point."

At first she didn't notice the tear that fell down Leni's cheek, partly because her vision was always somewhat obscured anyway by her long bangs, and because her sister's face was still slightly damp from the fountain's mist. But sure enough, upon inspection, Lucy saw a telltale streak extending down from Leni's eye.

"Is something wrong?" she asked, her usually monotonous voice betraying the slightest hint of concern.

"Oh, I'm just being silly is all, like always. Thinking about this place closing makes me feel really…" she paused and brought her finger to her chin, her mouth forming a slight grimace as she racked her mind for a way to finish her sentence. "What's that word? You know, that one for when you're remembering stuff but it makes you feel sad?"

"Wistful?"

"That's it! You're so good with words!" Though clearly still upset, she couldn't help but sound proud of her little sister. "This was my favorite place in the world and I don't want to see it go. I had so many good times here, with my friends, with you guys…" As her voice petered out, she paused, turning around and casting her gaze sadly into the fountain. She stared first at her reflection on the surface of the water, distorted by ripples, then at all the coins scattered around the bottom on the blue tiles. She considered reaching in and taking a few quarters for herself only so that she could toss them back in and wish again for the mall to spring to life once more. Then she'd do it again and again, repeating the process a thousand times until it came true. So entranced did she become in her fantasy that for a few seconds she nearly forgot everything else, until Lucy's hand reached out and touched her shoulder, sending a jolt through Leni's system as she returned to reality. "I'm sorry," she said, turning back to her sister, "I'm probably boring you. I'm talking like somebody died just because a place I like is going out of business. I guess I'm not just stupid, but shallow too."

"You're neither of those things, Leni…" She hesitated, unsure of how to proceed. Comforting others was never really her forté. Usually, she was the one to inspire discomfort in others, not resolve it. Unintentionally, of course, with her occult leanings and obsession with mortality. Though, given what Leni had just said, an idea struck her. One that would allow her to speak on her favorite subject. "You know," she began, slowly at first, still trying to parse out what she wanted to convey, "people think I'm weird because I'm so fixated on death. But the way I see it, death is a beautiful thing. It's what gives life meaning. Because everything is temporary, the time we have with the things we love is more valuable because its so limited. So if anything, its a good thing that the mall is closing. Now the memories you have of when it was open will be even more special to you. Do you remember when Lincoln accidentally deleted all of his old childhood pictures?"

"Yeah?" By her tone Lucy could tell Leni wasn't sure where this was going.

"He was sad because at first he thought that since he didn't have those photos anymore, all of those fun times might as well have never happened. But then he realized that he didn't need his pictures after all, because he still had his memories, just like we have ours." Taking her hand from her sister's shoulder, she touched her finger to Leni's forehead, smirking a little as the older girl went slightly crosseyed trying to follow the path of her hand. "You'll always have memories of the fun you used to have in this mall. And memories are forever. With them, you can revisit this place whenever you want in your head."

As she took her hand away, she could see that already her words had an effect on her sister, though not quite as much as she had hoped. "Yeah, I guess so." While her eyes no longer seemed so glassed over with tears, her overall demeanor remained mostly somber. Still, she eventually did bring her lips to a small smile, and before Lucy realized what was happening she found herself wrapped in a tight hug. "Thanks Lucy." They stayed like that for a few moments, holding each other as the fountain's cool mist sprayed around them, before finally breaking apart. "Hey, you hungry?" Leni asked, "You wanna get some lunch? My treat."

"I'd like that," Lucy said, one of her rare grins spread across her face.

Leni clasped her hands together, squeeing a little in excitement. If there was one thing Lucy always envied slightly from Leni, it was her ability to show such happiness at even the simplest of prospects. "Yay! After, will you read me some more of your poems? I think I'm starting to see why you like them so much."

She nodded, then took Leni's hand, and together they left the fountain and its hundreds of dollars worth of unfulfilled wishes behind.

* * *

Their options were limited, but after a brief search they quickly settled on pizza. After buying two thin and greasy slices they sat together at a metal table in the center of the vast hall, and at this time of day they had the entire food court to themselves. Upon sitting, Lucy Immediately set to work devouring her food, hungry as she was.

Leni was about to start eating as well, but paused when she heard a sound somewhere far above her head. It was a high pitched chirp, followed by the fluttering sound of wings flapping. When she glanced up she saw a bird, a tiny black dot darting around in the light, moving so fast that after only a few seconds of tracing its actions with her eyes she lost track of where it could be.

That was until a tapping sound drew her attention back, and she saw the bird skittering about on the floor near her. Small and dirt colored, it was by no measure beautiful. Still, the sight of it perked Leni up considerably, and for an instant she felt as she did at six years old, when a close encounter with an animal, no matter how common, could fill her with wonder.

One of its long talons went up and down up and down on the floor tile in a steady rhythm, as if in waiting. Its head moved around in jerky motions though its body remained still, and here and there it let out a little cooing sound. Leni stared into its eyes, so small and black yet warm, and it dawned on her what it had landed for.

Grabbing the crust of her pizza slice between her fingers, she gave a sharp tug, then tossed the resulting morsel to her new friend. After a moment of regarding it with something like trepidation, it pecked at the bread and took it into its beak, flying away with the food as Leni giggled brightly and waved farewell. It flew high, landing in one of the hanging baskets of greenery descending from the ceiling where no doubt it had made a cozy nest for itself.

A vision flashed in her mind, a vision of the whole court as a sort of aviary, with birds of all kinds making nests in the rafters and bathing in the fountain. Not just pigeons and finches, but exotic macaws and hornbills and even a dodo strutting along the hallways.

Their bright plumage filled her imagination with many colors and even when she snapped out of her reverie and returned to eating the sound of their caws still echoed in her mind, beautiful bird songs whistled in tune with the muzak over the loudspeakers.

Leni hummed along as she ate, feeling content with her favorite place's future purpose.

* * *

 _ **AN:** Thank you for reading this story about a shopping mall going out of business._


End file.
